Dynamics of formation of K-hole fractions of sulfur projectiles inside a carbon foil

The K{alpha} and K{beta} satellite and hypersatellite x-ray lines emitted by highly ionized sulfur projectiles passing with energies from 65 MeV up to 122 MeV through carbon foils of thickness of 15-210 {mu}g cm{sup -2} have been recorded using a Si(Li) detector. The additional hypersatellite Ky{sup h} peak proves that for such high energies of the sulfur ions very high subshells (4p and 5p) could be occupied. In order to study the dynamics of formation of K-shell vacancy fractions of sulfur projectiles passing through a carbon foil the dependence of sulfur K x-ray production cross sections on foil thickness has been examined separately for each recorded line using the three component model. For each projectile energy the values of K-shell hole production cross sections and K-shell electron capture cross sections (both common for all recorded x-ray lines in the case of each projectile energy) have been fitted, as well as the specific values (for each recorded x-ray line) of K-shell hole filling cross sections, which are directly connected with average lifetimes of appropriate states of sulfur ions. The obtained ''experimental'' values of K-shell vacancy production cross sections are much higher than the theoretical predictions. This suggests that apart from themore » ionization process the excitation from K shell into higher shells is responsible for a production of K-shell vacancies, which has been confirmed by recent classical trajectory Monte Carlo calculations.« less